


The Concoction

by JessaLRynn



Series: Recipes for Disaster [4]
Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/M, Gen, Geniuses, Humor, Ruining Your Tropes, The Author Regrets Nothing, Truth Serum
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-12
Updated: 2018-03-12
Packaged: 2019-03-30 12:40:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,358
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13951749
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JessaLRynn/pseuds/JessaLRynn
Summary: A true favorite, sure to please a crowd! Season one Time Lord in leather with "The Concoction". Place one pink-and-yellow human female in serving cell. Add previously prepared Time Lord. Stir in aliens. Add secret ingredient. Run for the hills.





	The Concoction

The door to Rose's cell flew open and she darted toward it, determined to punch, kick, scratch, and even bite her way out if she had to do. She had to rescue the Doctor; there was no telling what these aliens had done to him by now.  
  
Three extremely tall, chlorine green aliens caught her and held her. A fourth draped a bundle of leather and denim from his shoulder over the narrow camp bed that was one of the only two pieces of furniture in the whole cell. "Doctor!" Rose shrieked.  
  
"Oolg," said the Doctor.  
  
"What have you done to him?!" Rose demanded of the aliens. "What the hell do you even _want_?"  
  
"We want the secret," said the one who had carried the Doctor. "He will give it to us. It is only a matter of time."  
  
Rose kicked at that alien until the three who held her lifted her up and tossed her onto the cot on top of the Doctor. His arm snapped up around her waist but other than that, he didn't move, didn't say a word, didn't even open his eyes.  
  
Rose scrambled frantically for purchase to get off the Time Lord and go slightly murder the things who had done this to him, but it was too late. The Doctor was holding her steady and the aliens had made good their withdrawal. Rose looked down at the Doctor, to find him in possibly the worst condition she'd ever seen him in after someone had had a go at him.  
  
"I'll only kill 'em a little," Rose muttered darkly.  
  
"How d'ya do that, then?" the Doctor asked in a faint, dreamy sort of voice.  
  
Rose pushed herself up with her elbows against the cot, worked her knees up until she was straddling the Doctor's hips, and peered down into his drawn, pale, and sweating face. No change. "Doctor?" she whispered. When she got no response, she sighed. "Oh, Doctor," she said softly, tenderly, sadly. The Doctor made a strangled noise at the sound of his name and struggled beneath her. What had they done to him?  
  
"You'll have to let me go," Rose told him gently, trying her best to be comforting. "M'ok, now. Just let me move an' I'll let you breathe."  
  
The Doctor only groaned in response to that and, any other time, Rose's mind would have darted straight to the nearest gutter and gone in with a swan dive. That sound... She shook her head firmly. This definitely wasn't the time for her silly human fantasies. Never mind how perfect the position was for them. She would worry about that later. Maybe in a warm bath.  
  
The Doctor's arm slowly relaxed and Rose carefully clambered to her feet. She had to wedge her knee between his thighs at one point (think about that later, too) and he writhed in what was probably fear. No bloke wanted anyone's knees that close to sensitive anatomy.  
  
"Budge," Rose said, when she was finally standing. She prodded gently at the Doctor's side. He wriggled a bit to give her some room, then muttered some untranslated complaint when she settled down next to him and turned toward his face. She needed to watch him to be sure he was going to be all right. Her shirt sleeve would have to do in lieu of a handkerchief, and he turned his face in to her touch with every stroke.  
  
Once his face was clear of the obvious sweat, Rose reached behind her for the coarse woolen blanket that had been laying across the foot of the narrow camp bed. Her hand encountered denim on several occasions, but not the blanket. With a frustrated snort, she turned her head to look for the thing, her hand on the Doctor's thigh for balance.  
  
"No idea what you're lookin' for there, but it's a little bit further up."  
  
Blanket forgotten in the face of that absolutely incredible pronouncement, Rose's head whipped around so she could stare at the Doctor. She lost her tentative balance in her haste and slipped the short distance to the floor, bruising her bum mildly and her dignity severely.  
  
"Ouch," she said, forcing herself to her feet.  
  
The Doctor's eyes flew open as she leaned over to check him for the very likely bump on his head. The usual piercing blue had gone a foggy, murky sort of grey and had a distinctly unfocused quality as he peered at her blankly. "Rose?"  
  
Rose grinned in relief. If he was awake, if he was at least aware enough to recognize her, he could probably recover quickly and work on a way to get them out of here. That was especially important, since she needed to murder the aliens a little for hurting him. "Doctor!" she exclaimed, practically singing his name in her joy.  
  
"Oh good, you remember my name." He grinned suddenly and, if he had been anyone else, Rose would have found it completely wicked. "Make sure you scream it really loudly, later, yeah?"  
  
Dark and alarming suspicions tumbled through Rose's head, especially as the Doctor's dazed but smug expression was almost immediately replaced by dazed bewilderment. "Doctor?"  
  
"When we're runnin', right?" he said softly.  
  
"Oh, right," Rose agreed, trying not to acknowledge that even she could hear the disappointment in her voice. Stupid human, of course he didn t mean... "What did they do to you?" she asked plaintively.  
  
He blinked a few times, then licked his lips. "Ah," he said. "Not good."  
  
"What?"  
  
"They've given me somethin'. Feels like a dual-active compound. Two effects," he added, rolling his eyes like she'd just done something abysmally stupid, possibly in response to her look. It was meant to be incredulous (she knew what dual-active was, thank you, how hard could that be?) but he'd apparently taken it wrong. Stupid Time Lord. "One ta make me talk, an' the other ta make me tell the truth when I talk."  
  
"Not good," Rose agreed, though she wasn't sure how not good it was exactly.  
  
His grin came up again, then, brilliant and self-satisfied. "But they don't know 'bout my superior Time Lord physiology. S'pose they're waitin' 'til it's taken full effect, but by the time they come back, I'll've metabolized it." He tried to sit up, fell back down and looked at the room as if it had mortally offended him. "Rose, tell the bloody cell ta hold still, would ya?"  
  
"Just lie down, Doctor," she soothed. "I'm sure your modest Time Lord superiority will handle it fine from that angle."  
  
"Most people, ya show 'em all of time an' space, and they're excited, thrilled, never heard of anything better. Not you, Rose Tyler, you gotta have time, and space, and chips." He mimicked her voice rather well despite his accent, and in a bored tone, said, "Oh, sure, it's great, Doctor, alien planet, no human's ever seen it, where's the fried potatoes?"  
  
Rose, knowing she could never take him too seriously, or risk losing sight of the person under all the wonder and rain, didn't say that. Instead, she gave him an arch look. "Didn't know ya could do voices. D'you have any more tricks?"  
  
He snorted, then grinned at her, mischief like a beacon despite the dazed shadow of eyes. "I can do many impressive things, Rose Tyler."  
  
Rose grinned back for as long as she dared to meet his eyes, then looked around the cell and finally spotted the blanket on the floor at the end of the bed. The Doctor blithely started to lecture on the various advantages to Time Lord biology, so Rose knew for sure that the talking part of the compound was working. He never talked, especially not when they were imprisoned. It had taken her a day and a half (not to mention the tantrum and a half) to even get what the last aliens wanted out of him.  
  
"...Biochemicals that can lessen reactions ta certain things. Or enhance 'em, if I want."  
  
Rose shook the blanket out and filed the expression he made as he said that under "things to have intense dreams about on my own time".  
  
"...Can hold me breath for upwards of fifteen minutes. Lotsa ways that could be useful, I think..."  
  
Rose ignored him and firmly refused to look at him while she was at it. He babbled on and on and on while she meticulously checked the blanket for bugs.  
  
"...Next ta no refractory period. That's the two hearts again, an' it might come in handy someday, I hope..."  
  
Her hands were shaking as she draped the blanket over the Doctor's body. TMI, she thought. Way too much information.  
  
"Thanks for this, you always take such fantastic care o' me." Rose dared to shoot him a quick glance, but he had his strangely innocent look on this time, the one that would probably get her into trouble until the day she died. How could a man who looked forty and was nine hundred possibly manage such childlike sweetness in his expression? She looked away when his smile started to grow wider. "I really like it. I wonder..."  
  
There was a slapping sound and Rose looked up to discover that the Doctor had his hand over his mouth. His eyes were wide, even if they were distinctly glazed over.  
  
"Take it the runnin' on at the mouth is a side effect?" Rose asked.  
  
He shook his head and slowly moved his hand, as if afraid he'd need to put it back very, very quickly. "It's the intended effect. I guess so I'll tell 'em whatever they want ta know. But they didn't ask, jus' said 'the secret', an' if I told 'em ev'ry secret I knew, they'd be there for years an' still none the wiser."  
  
"That's true," Rose cut him off. "But it doesn't all work on you, right? Even if you're talking, it doesn't have to be true, what you say I mean?"  
  
"Hope not," the Doctor said. "That'd be really bad. Can ya 'magine someone getting me ta tell 'em everythin' I know? I'd start with somethin' stupid an' by the time I got done with silly trivia an' maybe the history of a couple planets no one's heard of, they'd be long dead an' never get ta hear my biscuit recipes or sordid sexual fantasies.  
  
"Is _that_ a side effect?" Rose asked.  
  
"What?" the Doctor wanted to know.  
  
Rose decided it might be safer not to enlighten him that he'd talked more about... that... in the last ten minutes than he had in the entire time she'd known him put together. "Anything else I ought to know?"  
  
"I want to drag you down onto this bed and do things ta you that'll make you weak in the knees jus' remembering them." His eyes danced and laughed as he said this, so Rose knew one thing for sure, now, maybe two.  
  
One, it seemed the drug was turning him into an incorrigible flirt. Two, the truth telling part probably wasn't working. Maybe she'd best test it anyway, just to be sure.  
  
"What do you really think of my mum?" Rose asked innocently.  
  
The Doctor gave her a dirty look, an annoyed dirty look though, this time. In the most sarcastic tone she had ever heard out of him (even in Mickey's presence), he said, "Oh I'm absurdly fond of the woman. It's possible I'm a masochist or a martyr, but I can't seem ta help it. She's just a bit fantastic, really. Crazy as hell, o' course, but..."  
  
Rose smiled. "All right," she said with fond resignation, "you answered my question, you can stop."  
  
Obviously, the truth telling bit wasn't working at all, not if he could claim to like her mother. "You gonna be all right?" she asked after a bit.  
  
"Sure I'll be as all right as I ever am, once the building stops bouncin' around an' everything. Sit down, you'll be more comfortable, and it's easier ta... ah, better change the subject now.  
  
Rose looked around while he found a subject that didn't make his ears turn pink and kept talking. She decided to settle herself next to him on the cot; wasn't anything else she could do, really. Except wait.  
  
  


*?*

"...Constellation of Kasterborous. Well, technically, its Kasterborous the Time Keeper, looks a bit like an hour glass. Couldn't see it from there o' course, Trihedron's the central grouping, so... What?"

Rose, who had been listening intently to his catalog of interstellar cartography, blinked what she was sure was a very funny expression from her face. "Nothing," she said with a shake of her head. "So, why's it called Trihedron?"

"Used to be a trinary star system, long story, that... what?"

"What, what?"

"Rose Tyler, I can read most o' the expressions on your face, tell what you're thinkin', just from the look in your eyes. Don't even have ta check your biochemicals, though that's interesting sometimes, if a bit confusin'. But usually, it's easier jus' to..."

"Right," Rose interrupted, disbelieving, "what'm I thinkin' now, then?" She concentrated very hard on keeping a straight face while allowing one of her silly human fantasies to run a little amok through her head.

"Minx," the Doctor complained.

Rose had no idea whether that meant he could tell or not. "Readin' minds is cheating, Doctor."

"Wasn't readin' your mind, Rose, I always ask unless..." He rubbed a hand over his forehead and pinched the bridge of his nose. "Damn aliens. Anyway, you had that pretty, wistful look on your face, all far away an' happy. Am I boring you?"

"No!!" she denied vehemently, then winced as he did at her possibly too sharp exclamation. "No, Doctor, never." He gave her a dubious look, and she smiled. "Seriously. I was just thinking... you never talk about that stuff, hardly talk about anything personal, so it's kinda nice..." She chewed her lip at his thoughtful expression. "Not that I mind," she said urgently.

The Doctor chuckled, a warm dark sound that made shivers try to run up her spine. The hand she was holding caressed hers gently and caused more shivers. He seemed - had he? had she? - one of them was definitely closer. "Rose Tyler, if I told you half the things that go through my mind, you'd run screamin' home to your mother."

Rose had absolutely no idea what he meant by that, not really, but her body very much liked the conclusion it came to. Something clenched inside and her knickers were suddenly a little less comfortable. The Doctor's nostrils flared and his eyes went wide. "Although..." he murmured, and his voice sounded like liquid sin.

The cell door thumped open. Rose decided she now had a perfectly good excuse to kill the aliens three quarters of the way dead. The Doctor's eyes had gone shuttered again, his body held stiffly away from hers, for all that they were so close. "What?" she demanded rudely.

The Doctor started rattling off the process for making jelly babies. Rose turned to stare at him, alarmed. He looked even more blank than he had when the aliens first dragged him in here. However, one murky blue eye winked at her. She grinned back, the grin she saved just for him.

"...the extruder... one o' these days, you're gonna do that an'... where was I... oh, right. Jelly babies."

"He is ready to give the secret now," one of the large chlorine aliens said. "Take him."

"No!" Rose shrieked, standing up to throw herself between the aliens and her fragile, drugged Doctor. Every single time he tried to sit up, he complained about the cell spinning. She supposed someone who could feel the world turning under his feet would find any disruption in his equilibrium extremely disconcerting. She put her hands on her hips and did her best street-urchin-from-hell impression. "You lot wanna question him, you do it right here where I can watch."

"That's my girl," the Doctor said.

Rose wondered wistfully if he knew how right he was.

"Mine, mine, mine... land mine," he added.

"The secret!" the shortest of the three aliens demanded.

 

*?*

Two and a half hours later, the Doctor had given them the eleven herbs and spices in KFC, the formula to Harry Ramsden's fish batter, the secret ingredients in twenty-six different kinds of fizzy colas, the location of the Holy Grail (his coat pocket, but not the coat he was wearing), and the locations of three dozen other "missing" treasures. Strangely, more than half of them had been blown up. He had confessed that King Arthur had died in the final battle, and that several very popular celebrities in several different times and places were actually aliens in disguise. He had explained in detail that breaking out of Alcatraz wasn't the problem, it was breaking in in the first place that really killed you. He had revealed the answer to life, the Universe, and everything - 42.

The aliens were not impressed.

"Reveal the secret now, or harm will come to the female!"

"You touch her, you so much as look at her in a way I don't like, and the whole cosmos will tremble at the memory of your fate for centuries to come," the Doctor replied. He didn't sound threatening, didn't even twitch an eyebrow. He was utterly matter of fact about it. It was a little chilling, if a little arousing, to hear it.

"Is she yours, then?" the alien questioned intently.

"Yes," the Doctor replied simply. Rose didn't have it in her to object that she was hers, thanks ever so. Especially not with that look on his face.

"Then you will seek to protect her. What is the secret?!"

The Doctor started to say something - heaven alone knew what - but Rose had had enough.

"You know, you're gonna have to be a little more specific, here, dammit. If my life's on the line, now, I get to make the rules, right? An' rule one is you gotta actually tell him what you want. What the hell secret do you need? Haven't you figured it out yet? He knows everything, obviously, except one thing that isn't important, so don't you think you could kinda narrow it down? Before we all get old? What planet's your stupid secret come from? Is it history or food or myth or legend? Animal, vegetable, mineral? Anything?? Am I gettin' through t'ya at all??"

The aliens were stunned utterly speechless. "Looks like you could talk for days, too," the Doctor observed as she stood there, breathing hard and considering furthering her tirade with a few well-positioned slaps.

"Looks like," Rose agreed weakly. She smiled slowly at his brilliant grin as he patted the bed next to him. Sitting down gingerly, she was surprised but gratified to find his arm wrapped around her waist.

"Think you get that from your mum," he said. "Strong personality, her. S'one of the things I admire about the woman, but don't you dare tell her I said that."

Rose shook her head, disbelieving. "I'd never," she admitted. "She'd never believe me, anyway."

The Doctor nodded agreement, his grin widening. "You're better looking when you're angry, though," he added. "I mean, better than your mum. You're always beautiful, of course, even in the mornings when you just wake up, and I was just wondering. What don't I know?"

The whole thing had been too fast for Rose to process it properly, but the last registered well enough to bring a blush to her cheeks. "Never mind," she said softly, as grateful as she could possibly be that the Doctor had been given the truth drug and not her, since it would have worked on her very well.

"You can tell me, Rose," he coaxed persuasively, blue eyes still gray, but twinkling brightly. "Don't friends tell each other secrets?"

Rose sighed. "Yeah, they do. So, you gonna tell me a secret if I tell you one?"

"Sure," he agreed. "My secret is that these stupid drugs aren't wearing off as fast as I'd like."

"Ah," she said. "That's never good, is it?"

"Nope."

Rose sighed, then started thinking fast. What secret could she tell him that wouldn't get her dumped back down on the Powell Estate faster than you could say TARDIS?

She decided to forgive the aliens for most everything when they suddenly finished their conference and approached the bed, practically on tenterhooks. "We're sorry!!" one of them practically wailed. The others made various squeaking noises of agreement.

Rose wasn't sure if this was normal for their kind and looked to the Doctor for advice. He looked rather alarmed, and shrugged at her, then gestured her toward them, as if wailing aliens was her department or something. "Bloody hell," she muttered, "this was never in my job description."

She handed out tissues from her pocket (where were they earlier when she needed them, then?). After that, she distributed pats and shushes and listened sympathetically to various moans and complaints. These included, "never any good at threatening people," and "why can't we all get along?" and, her personal favorite, "you're a very nice scary person."

Eventually, she'd got them calmed down enough to talk. "We need the secret to the magical potion," the leader of the group said. "We've been trying to reproduce it for months, and have had no results. We thought, we hoped, when we heard the male talking so knowledgeably about our planet, that he would know. We didn't know he knew everything. How do you keep all that information in a tiny skull?"

True, the chlorine aliens heads were quite a bit larger than hers. "S'bigger on the inside," Rose commented dryly, while the Doctor glowered at her ferociously. She stuck her tongue out at him, and his hand was over his mouth again for some reason. She turned back to the aliens. "Where'd you get the potion, what does it do?"

"The potion came to us from Earth, brought by explorers who looked like yourselves. We must have it. It is this potion we feed the children to achieve the fine healthy skin-tones you see we have. But we have almost run out and they're all nutrient deficient and rather more grey than green. We apologize for the terrible treatment we have subjected you to, but we are desperate. You must help us!"

The Doctor and Rose looked at each other and Rose could see that their speech had definitely effected him. She sighed. It effected her, too. "Got a bottle of it or something?" she suggested.

"They're using it like a cosmetic, yeah?" Rose asked as one of the aliens scampered off to retrieve the bottle.

"Or like royal jelly for honeybees," the Doctor replied with a shrug. Then, he wandered off on a tangent about native and non-native Earth honeybee species.

The chlorine green alien reappeared with the bottle and Rose nearly choked. It was recognizable from a distance, of course, just one of those things you were used to, growing up where she did. Of course, it also made her want to gag, because she just happened to be one of the people in the world who utterly detested the stuff. "You're so kidding me!" she exclaimed, feeling like she might turn a bit chlorine green herself at any moment.

"Guess not," the Doctor replied cheerfully.

"But it's... oh, god, Doctor, it's awful!"

"Bet Rickey loves it."

"You heard what was in his cupboards," Rose replied. "He'll eat anything. You can't let them do this to children!"

He chuckled. "They obviously like it," he answered.

"Do you even know the secret formula? It's s'posed to be, well, you know, secret."

He stared at her. "Rose Tyler, I can tell ya what's in Coca-Cola an' you don't believe I know this? I was there when they invented the stuff. 1902. Good year." He looked up at the aliens and grinned broadly. "Someone get me a pen and paper," he said. "This'll prob'ly take a bit."

Rose looked at the bottle, at the Doctor, at the relieved looking chlorine aliens, and sighed. Of all the things in the Universe. She shook her head, stifling the urge to laugh. Who knew, really. She watched as the aliens admired the dark bottle with its distinctive red and yellow label and realized the Universe was even stranger than she'd ever imagined.

She'd just been threatened with death, after all. Over a bottle of marmite.

*?*

After that, it was a simple matter of the Doctor explaining his notes, and then the aliens released them with many apologies and, for some reason, quite a few small trinkets that the Doctor immediately stuffed into his pockets. She'd never got to see the little statuettes and now she probably never would, since anything that ended up in his coat was likely gone forever.

They walked back to the TARDIS hand in hand, but Rose couldn't help thinking back on the whole situation. "Did you get rid of the drugs?" she asked.

"Finally," the Doctor said. "Was a right mess, that, an' not one I ever want ta repeat. Sorry if I talked your ear off."

"I didn't mind," Rose assured him. "But I been thinking."

He opened the door to the TARDIS and let her enter ahead of him. "Yeah?"

"Well, it's just... the truth drug didn't work on you, yeah, but the talking drug did. How's that?'

"I never had a chance to analyze either of the drugs, Rose," he apologized.

"Yeah, see, that's what I thought. And then I got to wondering. How would I even know if the truth drug didn't work on you, anyway? I mean, brain the size of yours, clever as you are? It's exactly what you said earlier, right? Just 'cuz you have to tell the truth, what's to stop you telling all kinds of things so no one ever figures it out?"

The Doctor grinned down at her, his eyes finally back to their usual crystalline blue, glittering and sparkling in the TARDIS light. He winked at her, then kissed her forehead. "Rose Tyler, where do you get these ideas?"  


* * *


End file.
